E-mail a friendSen. Mel Martinez
airdate September 4, 2008
When Mel Martinez was elected as the junior senator from Florida, he made history as the first Cuban American to serve in the U.S. Senate. He previously chaired the Republican National Committee and served as HUD secretary. Martinez came to the U.S. at age 15 as part of a Catholic humanitarian effort—a journey he writes about in A Sense of Belonging. Prior to entering public service, he practiced law for 25 years, helmed the Orlando Utilities Commission and chaired the Orlando Housing Authority.
Florida congressman explains why Sen. John McCain has an opening this election season with Latino voters. (2:58)
Full interview. (7:36)
Sen. Mel Martinez
Tavis: Finally tonight, a look at how the Latino vote is going to impact this election. Earlier, I sat down with Florida Senator Mel Martinez, a Cuban-American who hopes to deliver Florida and Hispanics across the country for John McCain. Senator, nice to have you on the program, sir.
Sen. Mel Martinez: Pleasure, good to be with you.
Tavis: And congrats on the new book, "A Sense of Belonging: From Castro's Cuba to the U.S. Senate, One Man's Pursuit of the American Dream." It is a long way.
Martinez: It is.
Tavis: From Cuba to the U.S. Senate, huh?
Martinez: It is a journey, it is a journey, but America makes things like that possible, and I'm proud to have been able to live it.
Tavis: Give me a little taste of the back story of Mel Martinez.
Martinez: Well, I was born in Cuba and obviously had a wonderful childhood. My dad was a vet; we lived in a small city. A country life - it wasn't anything fancy, but it was a nice life. And then the old people, a revolution that changed life and things got upside-down pretty good.
My parents ultimately made a very tough choice, which was that they would send me out of the country in the care of the church, and so I came to America at age 15 with a suitcase, a lot of hopes and dreams and didn't know how scared I was until I got here, but plenty of fears at that point.
And obviously ended up in foster homes for four years until I was reunited with my folks. And then the interesting twist the book turns is that at that point I became my parents' surrogate parents, in a way. I never got to be a child again because then I really took over helping them become Americans. And I could speak the language, they couldn't - things like that.
Tavis: How does a boy with that responsibility navigate his way to the U.S. Senate years later, head of the RNC some time after that? How does that happen in America?
Martinez: I think you've got to have good people that are helping you along the way. You don't do it alone, obviously. I think I had a strong faith and I had a lot of personal discipline, I guess, to get through moments. And education, that's inseparable from success, I think, in America.
But a lot of good people who intervened, and my book details that. It talks about a lot of good folks that intervene in my life. Obviously the foster families - two different families that offer their homes to a teenage boy they didn't know from a place they hardly knew, and who didn't even speak their language at first. And so a lot of mentors along the way.
I think mentors can make such a difference, which is why I think role models and mentors can make a big difference for the youth of America today, particularly minority youth that are looking for a way out of a life that they know can be better elsewhere.
Tavis: I want to talk more broadly in a moment, Senator, about the Hispanic vote, if I can call it that. I want to start specifically, though, with your community in Florida. We have not heard in this primary season so much about Cuban-Americans in Florida. We know there are many of them there; we know they're a strong voting bloc.
We've not heard so much about them in part because of the drama around the Democrats not having the primary there, etc., etc. What's going to happen specifically with the Cuban-American vote this time around?
Martinez: I think number one is you need to understand that Florida's changing demographically and the Cuban-American vote is not the only Hispanic vote. There's a large segment of other nationalities and obviously Puerto Ricans that are U.S. citizens that make up the Hispanic vote of Florida.
The Cuban-American vote specifically I think will still be very reliably Republican in this particular race, but that's only a factor, and there's a pretty healthy mix. The last poll I saw show Florida Republicans supporting Senator McCain by a 50-some percent to 30-some percent for Senator Obama. But there's a lot of work to be done I think by both candidates in the Hispanic community at large, but certainly in Florida as well.
Tavis: I asked this question of someone else earlier, but no perspective like yours. Barack Obama did not win the Hispanic vote, more broadly speaking, in the primary campaign when Mrs. Clinton was still in the race. Of course, the spin now is we're going to fight hard for it; we're going to go after it.
But to the extent that he did not pull the Hispanic vote at the level that Mrs. Clinton did, does that mean there's an opening for John McCain?
Martinez: I don't think there's any question that there is, and John McCain is probably a little better-known entity. I think one of the things that worked against Senator Obama in the primaries is that he was not as well known, and I think that's a real factor. Senator Clinton had worked that community for years. She didn't just decide one day that she was going to run for president.
She's been working that community and had a lot of allies and friends. But I think Senator McCain does have a real opening. He comes from Arizona, he was very proactive in the immigration reform effort, which I think still carries a lot of weight in the Hispanic community. And so I think he has an opening.
Tavis: I guess the question is, and I know you've heard this as many times as I have; probably more, given who you are and what you do for a living, but as I talk to people in your community what I hear is that it depends on which John McCain shows up. To your point, John McCain was very courageous when they told him it didn't make sense for his campaign to go out the way he did, to step out that far, he courageously stood out front as a Republican, pushing for respectful immigration reform.
On the campaign trail, there are some who are hearing him a bit differently now on these issues, so which John McCain on immigration shows up between now and November?
Martinez: I think John McCain is solid on that issue, just as Barack Obama is as well. I think while I would have differences with Barack on a couple of things that happened at certain moments and the tactics that we were all using to try to get something done, I think they both showed well. And I think in the future, I think that they both will be for a comprehensive approach to immigration reform, with border security I think coming first.
But I think at the end of the day there's going to be a whole composite of issues that are going to come into being. I think a lot of Hispanics who've come to this country from other places put a high regard on security, and I think that's one of the issues that I think you'll see weigh on the minds of many Hispanics who have left a county that's trouble - as I did, but not just myself - and where they really feel America's a place of refuges and where they're going to want to find here the security, the national defense mantra, if you will, that I think Senator John McCain carries, at this point, very well.
Tavis: Can you imagine a time and a space - clearly it's not on the campaign trail, it's not in a season of running for the White House - can you imagine a time and a space, though, beyond the election of the next president, whoever it might be, where we're going to get some real conversation and some action on comprehensive immigration reform?
Martinez: I don't think there's any question. I think it has to happen. I think the country is waiting for something to be done because whatever - and this was a very divisive issue, and people had a lot of different ways they wanted to slice it. I think there was a great understanding that we have to do something, that we cannot just leave this issue like it is.
And I think one of the failures that we had and the way we handled it is that the border was not secure, and I think people didn't have a feeling that there was a seriousness of purpose about somehow putting order in the system - making it a legal sort of system, not just a legality that we had for so long.
Tavis: Finally, since you were at one point the head of the Republican Party, talk to me about the Republican Party's efforts or lack thereof to reach out to voters of color.
On my radio program this weekend, I told you when you walked in I'm featuring a young lady who I met here from California, where I live. Twenty-six years old, became a citizen in March, and she's here as a delegate at your convention from March until now. Pretty quick journey, I told her.
But as I walk around the halls here, I think we all have to admit that this party can do a better job of reaching out to voters of color. What say you about how they do that and when they're going to get serious about that?
Martinez: We make an effort, and I don't think there's any question that efforts have been made. And in Florida, I think we've done a heck of a lot better than the national party has. That was one of the things I was attempting to bring about during the short time that I was in the party.
But the fact of the matter is we've got to do much better. We've got to do much better by being out there and making it clear that this is a big tent party. This is a party that welcomes all. We've made the case, as I say, successfully in Florida, I think, but I think it still remains as challenge ahead for us and the rest of the country. I think John McCain could make a big difference in that.
Tavis: We will see, we will see.
Martinez: Absolutely.
Tavis: He's still senator from the state of Florida, at one point head of the RNC. A new book from Senator Mel Martinez, "A Sense of Belonging: From Castro's Cuba to the U.S. Senate, One Man's Pursuit of the American Dream." Senator, nice to have you on the program.
Martinez: Good to be with you, thank you.
Tavis: Good to see you, sir, thank you very much.
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